


Arrow to the Knee

by Northisnotup



Series: Shot Through the Heart [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sweet Home Alabama Fusion, Identity Porn, Kinda, Love at First Sight, M/M, Reconciliation, Reunions, Secret Identity, Secretly Married
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-11-07 21:21:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20823989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northisnotup/pseuds/Northisnotup
Summary: Jesse hasn't seen his alias written out in a dog's age - not since he had two flesh arms and a whole heart anyway. It's just his luck the next time he does, it's on divorce papers.





	Arrow to the Knee

**Author's Note:**

> This work would not have been possible without many things. First, the introduction of one North to the Overwatch fandom by zawehzaweh and Davaia, second the handholding and constant cheerleading of Rox, Saner, Fade, March and El. Thank you so much, ladies and gents. Your support means everything to me and there are no words for how much I appreciate every single one of you.
> 
> Finally, last but never least, thank you so much to pinetreelady and Za who gave this fic the much needed SpaG once over which allowed me to finally post the finished product!

A low murmur of Japanese ebbs and flows behind him, undercutting Winston’s briefing. The words are just too quiet and McCree’s Japanese too rusty for him to make it out. Genji and that mysterious kin-killing brother of his, then. The newest of the new recruits, (having arrived at the Watchpoint just a week ago after a months-long campaign of fervent letter writing on Genji’s behalf) and the only one that McCree has yet to meet in person. Which, given that he tends to call the man ‘Genji’s kin-killing brother,’ could be a good thing.

Genji himself wants to give McCree time to get used to the idea of his brother as a person instead of the seed of all the rage and self-destruction that existed in Genji when they first met all those years ago. So far, McCree’s only seen the outline of strong, tensely muscled shoulders and glossy raven-black hair shot through with silver before the man swept out of his sightline. 

Without a face to compare to, he’s left with the impression of a man much different than Genji is, with his lean physique and easy laughter, and more close to the Genji that was. Tensed and sharp like a bear-trap waiting to be sprung.

“And, we have one last order of business to take care of.” Winston chuckles, adjusting his glasses and pulls out a manilla envelope, battered and marked by international mail. 

McCree whistles low. “Hot damn, who racked up jury duty then?” Paper mail has gone on a bit of a wane and wax type cycle since the Omnic War. It’s expensive, horrible for the environment, but you can’t fucking hack paper. So. It ain’t going completely extinct any time soon.

“You,” Winston slides the thick envelope across the meeting table. “Or, actually, one of your aliases.”

Quiet laughter and a couple of jeers circle the table but Jesse’s too busy gaping like a fish to take much notice of the whos and whats. Jacob McQueen is a name he ain’t seen in a dog’s age. Not since he had two flesh arms and a whole heart anyway. 

“Not sure what I’m in for, but I can tell you it sure ain’t jury duty, especially not comin’ from Japan!” He doesn’t let his hands shake when he rips open the thick envelope. Keeps on letting his mouth run so he doesn’t have to think too hard. “McQueen ain’t really a whole person, see, and the last time he was anywhere near Japan was nearin’ on a decade a-ago…” 

Lena gasps over his shoulder, sayin’ something McCree can’t hear over the static hum of denial ringing between his ears.

“Hell. No.”

“McCree?”

“Nah,” In a fit of melodramatic whimsy he inherited straight from the King himself, McCree leans over, snatching a couple of the matches Junkrat plays with (ignoring his wounded cry at the loss) and lighting one off the days-old stubble he’s been too busy to shave. “I ain’t goin’ out like this, I’ll tell you that right goddamn now.”

“Jesse! A-are you okay, love?” Lena yelps as the papers catch fire and it’s all McCree can do not to snarl at her. Nothing about this is her fault. Lena’s just being sweet ol’ Lena and he’s got no right to be pissy about that.

“Ten years and not a damn word and he thinks he can just! Winston, I’m gonna need to take some personal time. Hey,” he swings around in his chair and has to blink away the side-slip feeling of deja vu as a wisp of pretty gold silk wrapped up in dark hair disappears behind Reinhardt’s bulk. Aches for just a second before he pulls himself back to the present. Here and now he is more than fine with the kin-killing such and such not sticking around to witness him on the worst day of his life. “Genji. You up for a trip? Only my Japanese is garbage after not speakin’ it so long and I ain’t as familiar with the territory so —”

Angela places her hand on McCree’s arm, ready to take control if it seems like he’s gonna lose it. Prudent to a fault. “Jesse! Slow down, why are you going to Japan?”

“We’re goin’ to track down my erstwhile husband once and for all!” He snaps and pays exactly no mind to the raucous cries and surprised shouts that follow.

The envelope is real thick, nice and official for the scarcity of papers inside of it. Old letterhead, several years out of fashion, kanji in neat columns over a short English paragraph. Signed and dated. The ‘Petition for Dissolution of Marriage’ is a short document. 

One McCree is happy to see being reduced to ash… Mostly to ash. The cardstock don't burn nice and he can’t really fault Athena for turning on the fire alarm or Winston for smacking the fire out.

“Of course,” There is no hiding the shit-eating glee in Genji's tone. The cruel-to-be-kind mockery that McCree would happily give back at any other fucking time. The alarm ceases it’s bleating once the last of the edges stop smoldering and Genji pulls the still mostly intact papers toward himself greedily. “I would be more than happy to assist in tracking down this… Satō Ichirō?”

The teasing tone falls flat.

“Genji?” McCree growls. Not liking the pointed way Genji’s visor stares at the half-burnt flag of McCree’s failure that lay between them. 

“Your husband’s name is Satō Ichirō?” 

He crosses his arms, yanking out of Angela’s lax grip to do so. “And? You makin’ something of it, friend?” The white noise of incredulity lowers, a good half of the assembled still exclaiming over his marital status and the other half over the validity of said status.

See, back when, the other party of his marriage had been a source of gossip and amusement, but the marriage itself had never been up for discussion or debate. McCree'd never been never shy about calling himself a married man, showing off a tarnished, greening ring he wore on a chain to anyone dumb enough to imply an interest or vague curiosity. He was off the market. Took an arrow to the knee. Roped in and hitched down and only Reyes had ever had the balls to give him shit for it. 

(It’s a truth long known: military types gossip worse than any knitting circle, prayer group or book club McCree has ever met. In the Overwatch that was, the list of who or what he might have been married to was long and varied and included, when last he checked, a clone of John Wayne made from his cryogenically frozen corpse, his boss, his ideals, a go-go dancer, his secret chili recipe, etc. Genji, once upon a time, had placed a morbid bet on Peacekeeper being his spouse.)

“Well…” Mei’s quiet voice leeches some of the aggression out of McCree’s shoulders. He can feel his posture loosen and his face smooth out of its snarl, losing that threatening edge as his attention goes to the woman across from him. Maybe that ain’t fair, he knows first hand how she could freeze him solid at a glance, but it’s how he was raised and even now he can’t help but make himself smaller to make the gentler of those around him feel a little more at ease. “It’s just. As far as I am aware, those are both very common names in Japan.”

Ice starts to crystal McCree’s stomach and creep up through his ribs. “How common?” 

Mei worries at her lower lip. Genji is silent beside him. “Guys? How common?”

“It would be like looking for John Smith, in America, I think,” Mei finally says, dipping her head apologetically.

McCree forces himself into taking a long, deep breath, and to think through a possibility he never gave much credence in all these years. “What...what exactly are my chances that Ichirō ain’t even his real name?”

Mei’s beautiful face contorts in a sympathetic grimace, which is a yes, no matter which way you slice it, and McCree has to fight with himself not to slam his head against the conference room table.

“What,” Genji’s voice buzzes, shorting out in a tell McCree has only ever heard once before. A long time ago, and in very different circumstances. “Where did you meet?”

McCree’s attention snaps to him like a bloodhound catching scent. “You know my husband.” It’s not a question.

“Maybe,” Genji says, voice still tight, like he doesn’t want to be right.

Working his jaw for a moment, McCree waits long enough to see if Genji will volunteer anything more before he grits out, words sandpaper rough: “Taiwan. We were married on October 28th, 2064.”

Genji gasps like his lungs have stopped working, the vents on his back and sides fluttering open and closed arrhythmically. Angela abandons him in a flash, letting go of his flesh arm to crouch beside their friend and attend to his glitching cybernetics. “I’m going to kill him,” he says faintly.

“Holy hell, you do. You know my husband,” McCree croaks, throat suddenly drier than the desert he grew in. Ten years of desperate hope and disappointment all crash into him at once. He’s so very glad he never stood up, because he can’t feel anything below the pounding of his heart against the cage of his ribs; knees and spine both turned to custard left out on a hot day. 

“We’ll just give you some space,” Winston says, beginning to herd the rest of the gawking agents out, much to the very vocal disappointment of Hana, Lena and, to everyone’s surprise, Soldier 76. 

Finally, there’s just the two of them left, Angela edging out slowly and reluctantly once Genji’s internals have evened out and are back on track. The silence doesn’t even have a chance to settle in and get comfortable before Genji’s incredulous voice breaks through, “A week. You married him after only knowing him a week.”

That’s not a question either, though it’s phrased like one. Though it maybe should be one. It is a judgment and McCree can’t even fault him for it. He groans, using his left hand to rub hard and punishing at the headache now lurking behind his eyes, waiting to strike. “Genj, I asked him to marry me on day goddamn one. It just took a week to get the license and an appointment with the Justice. Had me a husband for three whole months ‘fore it all went to hell.”

“How?” A lesser man might've called the noise a whine.

Deliberately misunderstanding, McCree clears his throat, trying to tuck the bruise-tender memories away, back into the box they burst out of. “Blackwatch called and I had to answer. Bad intel. Worse op and I ended up spendin’ two months in HQ regrowing my damn intestines. By then I knew he’d gone back home.”

He'd felt gutted all over again.

They’d been talking about it. Jesse moving with him back to Japan when Ichirō’s work in Taiwan was completed. There were tentative, fairweather plans for apartment hunting that Ichirō worried at with a paranoia that was unlike him. Jesse’d figured his overbearing family came into it somehow and never pressed for more details when the subject would come up. 

If his family was in bed with Yakuza, well, McCree ain’t sure if that makes living under an assumed name more or less suspicious.

Genji swears, long and low and creative enough that McCree feels it necessary to offer him the first pull on the flask he unearths from his kit. Genji’s robo-organs can process alcohol at whatever speed he wants them to, which is handy in a pinch, but can make him a shitty fucking drinking partner. Today though, today he yanks his faceplate off with a judicious application of force, using the same quick and borderline violent motions to unscrew the flask and drink deep of the cheap whiskey. “How,” he coughs, “how did you not know it was an alias? Did you not run even a cursory check before you married him?” 

“Hey!” McCree protests, “I’ll have you know it was all above board. Everything checked out through Overwatch leads.” And it had. He found a modestly wealthy real estate business that had boomed in the wake of the Omnic Crisis, licenses, university degrees, and even fucking dental records. All honestly accounted for and under his darlin’s name. Sure, lookin’ back there were signs. The bodyguards, the very prominent tattoos, the gun calluses; but any time suspicion would crawl up Jesse’s spine to force a question out of his mouth, casually as could be, Ichirō had an answer. 

He had dry, mean jokes about accounting and office work, had spreadsheets and expense reports he worked hard on and sent off with annoying regularity. Had a work phone along with his personal one that he would never avoid and answered near religiously. Had meetings with legitimate, upstanding businesses that not even Jesse could find dirt on. And, more convincing than anything else, Ichirō soaked in Jesse’s stories of travel like a sponge, as eager for the vicarious living as he was for Jesse himself. 

“This is my first time out of Japan,” he’d confided with a wry smile, curled between Jesse’s arms and the balcony, sharing a coffee cup back and forth as the sun rose. “I have to do well here, or my family may never trust me to leave again.” At the time, Jesse had kissed his cheek, made overwrought promises not to get in the way of Ichirō’s work and to one day take him to India and Spain and, horribly, back home to the States. One day. 

Genji turns baleful eyes on him, catching the careful wordage. Overwatch leads. McCree hadn’t even the faintest notion of asking around Blackwatch informants. He hadn’t seen any reason to. 

“When I managed to get back to that side of the world, it was like he never fuckin’ existed. I did everything I could. I pulled security footage and travel records, bank statements — I spent a year makin’ our contacts give me anything they could, Genj.” 

“What happened after a year?” 

The flask smacks into his left hand, ringing deep and sending awful vibrations up his elbow. “Talon. You remember how it was when you first joined up. They’d been a thorn in our sides for years but ‘round then, I guess they’d sunk their teeth into Blackwatch and they were makin’ us feel it.” 

The beginning of the end: intel started to get worse, meaning casualties and pointed questions from desk jockeys that never saw a gun, much less a battle. Back to back ops with few supplies and no support... 

"Give it back if you're just going to play with it. I need so much alcohol for this conversation." Genji snaps him out of his recollection, making 'gimme' fingers at the flask. "When I was extracted—"

McCree still winces at the detached, emotionless wording even as he knows it’s for his own benefit.

“Angela said it was a miracle I was saved. I assumed she was talking about the timing, but Blackwatch wasn’t in Hanamura with the purpose of extracting me, were they?” 

“Nope. It was all luck. Most of us on the ground that day didn’t even know you were an informant. Reyes gave me a long leash so I was chasin’ a lead on property rights that turned out to be nothin’ at all.” Gabe, with his big, romantic heart always at war with his cutthroat pragmatism, gave him just enough rope to hang himself. As always. Let Jesse search ‘til his heart was empty and aching and he could see the strain it was causing his people. Let Jesse come to him, hat in hand and call off the search himself.

Nodding slowly, Genji taps the table as if in thought. McCree rolls his eyes, sending the flask back down after stealing a burning nip of his own. “It’s been a decade, Jesse. That is a long time to pine after a flight of fancy from your youth.” He leans in, reminding McCree less of the sparrow Zenyatta nicknames him and more of a bird-of-prey, eyes sharp and intent. “Why is this man so important? Is it your pride?”

McCree takes the time to think about his answer, holding his tongue against the barb Genji’s condescension so truly deserves. Sweeping his hat off, he runs flesh and bone fingers through thick hair in need of a wash and comb. “I wish I could say it was just pride. I wish I could say it’s about how he knew to send these here. If he knows where I am, he must know who I am, and how long has he known? Couldn’t have been set up from the start, cause I had nothin’ but my comm unit on me back then, no papers, no drives, and nothing to say who I really was or what I belonged to.”

“But it's not?” Genji’s voice is the dirt over a trip line, a casual cover over a spring-loaded trap. 

McCree sighs, rolling his shoulders back and opening his posture up. Even if he had anything to hide, it’d be stupid to try and hide it from the only man who can give him what he wants. “Naw. Sure, that all flashed through my mind, but really… Genji, how many dates have you ever seen me on?” The best he can do now is be as honest as possible and hope Genji sees what he needs to.

“Huh.” Genji leans back, the conference chair creaking loudly beneath his heavy metal ass. “I believe I remember you taking Crews’ sister out, but you acted more like a chaperone than a date.”

He’d forgotten about that. Oof. “And boy, did she need one. Aside from that, in ten years there have only been five people I’ve liked enough to romance and each and every one has ended in utter fucking disaster because no matter how unfair it is, I can’t stop comparing them to that man.”

Genji whistles. An interesting noise, given that his vocal cords and most of his lower jaw are all somehow artificial. “You really were in love with him."

"Completely and without reason. Genj — he wasn't a nice man.” McCree says and forces himself to continue instead of taking it back. Genji knew him, possibly even knows him presently. Besides, Jesse’d never been anything but awfully fond of his husband’s many faults and he wasn’t about to start pretending otherwise. “He was a spoiled, arrogant little prince who made me laugh and was willin' to be absolutely ridiculous if I asked him sweet enough."

Genji sighs loudly and takes a long pull from McCree’s flask before he straightens up. "Come. Your awful whiskey is done and I—"

"Need so much alcohol for this, so you said." McCree scoffs lightly, jamming his hat back on his head. "Go on, then. You just tell me when I've passed whatever arbitrary line you've drawn in the sand."

"Hey! I found out at the same time you did, forgive me for needing to process the information," Genji waits for him in the doorway, slamming their shoulders together when McCree tries to step around him. It's the type of borderline mean roughhousing they fell into years ago, and it shocks a laugh out of him, having missed this side of the man. Genji at one with the universe is still just Genji and that’s — that's good to know.

Genji steers them towards The Bar, which is not a bar at all, really, but a den just off the main commissary where Athena makes them store the alcohol. (She’s tough on liquor, probably a side effect of policing soldiers for as many years as she has. She logs passes into and out of The Bar and insists that any liquor brought into the base is added to her inventory.)

"You were friends then?" McCree hazards, tipping his hat to one of Athena's many cameras before leaving it with his serape to decorate one of the stools as he steps up and takes his place behind the bar of The Bar. Weariness begins to settle into his bones and make itself at home as the emotional rollercoaster of the last half hour starts to catch up with him. Divorce. Mother of fuck.

"We're learning to be."

Accouterments first. Two short glasses pulled out of the fridge, stolen spheres of ice in their silicone molds, sugar cubes, bitters and…! He grabs an orange from the basket on the bartop, giving it a showy roll along his arm before he takes the zester to it, dropping two fragrant peels in with the sugar and bitters to muddle together against the heavy, icy bottoms on the glass. 

Once Zarya's ice is added and rolled around in the sugar orange grit, McCree tosses the molds in the sink to deal with at a later time and cascades his good, imported bourbon — rich as honey and just as sweet — over the whole thing. Never one to lay off an advantage, he gives it a stir and tops Genji's drink with a candied cherry before sliding it down the worn wood and into his waiting hand.

Swirling his own amber cocktail, McCree takes a long sip, savoring the sharp-smooth bite of the liquor with its butterscotch forward and lingering citrus finish. "Now, what in the actual fuck does that mean?"

“It means that hindsight is a clear path, my friend.” 

McCree clicks his tongue over the word ‘friend,’ shaking off the instinctive regional reaction to the word.

“What, and I cannot stress this enough, the _fuck_ does that mean, Genji. Either tell me or decide I ain’t good enough, but for the love of all hell, do one or the other,” He forces himself to take another slow, lingering sip of the finely made drink. Forces himself to stand straight and meet Genji’s eyes as he plays with the cherry instead of drinking at all. 

“You wear the buckle now. I was surprised.” Genji says casually, not at all like he is avoiding the subject. “You’ve had it for as long as I’ve known you, but you never wore it.”

With a half-remembered melody drifting up from that part of his mind that’s still lingering in the past, McCree reacts. Body settling into the trained relax-tense-relax stillness of a fighter waiting for an opening. Once, he was a very good black ops agent. And no one gets to be as good as McCree was by ignoring their own tells. No wide brim to hide the sharp of his eyes and no costume flair to distract from, the strike-ready posture is as obvious to Genji as it is to McCree’s own pride. He successfully fights the urge to hook his thumb in his belt and rub his fingers over the tarnished edges of the buckle in question but loses his battle against holding his tone. “Genji.”

“Made in Taiwan?” 

Ichirō insisted. 

McCree’s gut clenches, and he takes another sip in favor of snapping something harsh in a poor attempt at deflection. Compartmentalization is a nifty little trick, and has saved his life more times than he can count, but comes with a price. He can shove his emotions and responses away to be dealt with at some nebulous ‘later’ time, but he doesn’t always get to choose when that ‘later’ is. It’s been years since he’s allowed himself to really think about Ichirō and their time together and right now the old memories, carefully tucked away in silken cloth, are rattling against their gilded cage.

“He was makin’ fun of me. Picking out the most obnoxious, Americanized knick-knacks and souvenirs,” McCree admits, smiling in spite of himself. The belt buckle is the only one he still owns, the rest lost to time and wear. He still feels a pang for the shirt with the bald eagle that read ‘FUCK THE POLICE.’

Genji nods, face impassive."Okay."

"Okay?"

Genji removes the ball of ice from his cup, resting it on one of the many novelty shot glasses that line the bartop and sucks back his drink with a _joie de vivre_ McCree finds both admirable and insulting. "Yes. Okay. I am satisfied, you have my blessing and therefore, I am officially removing myself from the situation. Good luck."

He spins himself off the barstool, getting halfway across the room before McCree has the presence of mind to pick his damn jaw off the floor. "Hey! You get your metal ass back here, Mr. Roboto, I bared my god damn heart and you owe me some answers!"

"I am already more involved then I wanted to be," he calls back, continuing to move but just slow enough that McCree can’t call it ‘fleeing.’

"Who's fault is that, I wonder?"

Genji stops in the doorway, folding his arms across his chest and forming himself into an immovable wall. "You broke his heart once, McCree."

McCree huffs, taking the hit like he deserves. "Broke my own heart too. I just want a chance to say my piece. Apologize. No more, no less."

Genji stares him down, making him wait. The open book that is his face without the mask smoothed over into a peaceful calm that sends an itch down McCree’s spine. A beat. Makes him feel like Genji’s eyes can see through his skin to his soul. Then two. McCree’s fingers twitch, the tension making them itch for a trigger he doesn’t have. 

"Alright," Genji huffs, softening. "You’ll get your chance."

The ice in his glass cracks, the soft sound echoing in the quiet room. “You can’t promise me that, Genj.” McCree says, unwilling to be moved by Genji’s sudden amiable nature.

“You still love him. He wasn't expecting that.”

“You really think you can convince him to see me?” Hope strangles the words that want to pour up and out of his throat. “You think there’s any chance at all…” He missed me. He still loves me. I can fix this. We can still —

Genji snorts, indelicately. “I don’t think he will be able to resist,” he says, cryptically. A parting shot, likely in retaliation for the way he’s weaving, ever so slightly as he slips through the doorway. Stealing away before McCree can get another word in edgewise.

Not one for waste, McCree throws the melting ice back into Genji's empty cup with another shot, leaving it to sweat as he nurses the rest of his drink through the impulse to race the cyborg down and _make_ him talk. It wouldn’t do anyone any good; Genji is being Genji. In that, he has said all he is willing to and will now keep his peace come hell or high water. 

We’re learning to be. What in all the stars above does that mean? 

Genji recognized the name immediately. Despite all the different ways the kanji could be written, despite how supposedly common both names were, Genji recognized ‘Satō Ichirō’ as a name which belonged to one particular man.

Genji, who said nothing when McCree asked if Satō Ichirō was even his real name.

There is a chance, McCree realizes, an awfully large chance, that his husband wasn’t tied up by the Yakuza, or contracted by them, but _was_ Yakuza himself. Deadlock wasn’t the only organized crime syndicate to take advantage of the vacuum caused by the Omnic Crisis. Far from it, in fact.

A lesser family, perhaps. 

Maybe a Shimada cousin, heaven forbid.

“I’m either too drunk or not drunk enough for this,” McCree scowls, and sips at his sweating glass, refusing to treat his nice, imported bourbon like the cheap rotgut he usually fills his flasks with. 

In a good drinking mood, McCree never minds drinking well, it’s meant to burn and the cringe is part of the fun. But in a poorer mood, he always reaches for his top-shelf. Fixes himself drinks that invite him to linger and appreciate them, fancy things that force him to take his time and think about the liquor he’s taking in. Force him to think — period. 

He half-hums a bar, that old half-remembered song tickling the very tip of his tongue. One line repeats over and over, like a corrupted file. “_Then you’ll know just what to do if you still want me…_” 

Blowing out a frustrated breath, McCree eyes the neat line of novelty shot glasses that run the length of the horseshoe shaped bar. Rolls another sip of his fine liquor over his tongue as where, when and how's turn his brain on its rattling edge. But, a man don’t get fuckin’ interpanetary’d on the good stuff because any shot after the second one is just gas in the engine. 

Slowly McCree puts the bourbon back on the shelf, and reaches underneath for Jim, Jack or José, as any one of those fine gentlemen’ll do. “_If you still want me_...Athena, you can go ahead and let whoever’s on med shift know I’m likely gonna be spending the night here.”

“Of course, Agent McCree. May I monitor your vitals this evening?”

Bless her. Athena was made to ride herd on soldiers and, according to Winston, she is tickled pink to have so many people to watch over and care for again.

"Yes, ma'am." he replies. Athena isn't a God Program. But she's both sentient and omnipresent throughout the base and that's enough to deserve more than a little respect, in McCree's opinion. "Thank you kindly."

"It is my pleasure, Agent McCree.”

* * *

He’s woken up in worse places than The Bar. Better places, too, but he’s warm and safe with Athena chiming overhead, and it’s better than he might deserve at the moment. Sitrep: His mouth is sour, his head hurts, and he has the lassitude of someone in dire need of fluids. 

Gold flickers out of the corner of his eye when he blinks through the crust and McCree near moans. “_Tie a yellow ribbon ‘round the old oak tree_,” he sings into his arms, exacerbating the ache in his head but finally finding the rest of the words to the ear-worm that’s been lurking around the edges of his mind since yesterday. “_It’s been three long years, do you still love me_?”

Not a sound echoes from behind him. Not a shift of cloth or hiss of breath displacing the air and a cold certainty settles in his gut, kicking up the nausea left by bad whiskey and care-worn memories. Genji’s parting shot finally puzzling into place and completing the picture. “Never took you for a coward, honey. But I guess things have changed in the time gone by.”

“Excuse me?” Oh, that voice. Clipped with fury but still sweet as sin. Without looking, McCree knows his darlin’ will be stood up to his full height, shoulders stiff and mouth set into a stubborn scowl.

“Y’heard me.” 

The papers he left with good riddance on the conference room table are thrown in front of him. 

McCree looks up. 

And his traitorous heart starts to thunder in his chest. Shimada Hanzo is not the man McCree remembers. Which is probably fair as his rose-coloured memories tell him he married an overworked accountant and not an international assassin. But, add the weight of guilt, of long years alone to Ichirō’s face and the one his mind conjures for him is not dissimilar to the one looking back. "I bought you that silk, or did you think I wouldn't remember?"

It's still as bright as it is in his memories, though he forgot the pattern that shimmers subtly from the fabric. And how they'd bickered endlessly over what it most resembled. Clouds or waves. Scales or fans.

“I did not think it mattered,” Hanzo says stiffly, lying both badly and obviously enough McCree’s eyebrows raise of their own accord. He huffs and turns his head to avoid scrutiny, the noise of embarrassed derision still so familiar McCree has to work not to react and still ends up swallowing hard. “I assumed Genji would give me away before a scrap of cloth from an ill-advised fling more than a decade past.” 

Well, well, well. Don’t that just smack of bitterness. 

“You’re the one who held onto it,” he points out, past the point of kindness or mercy. He could try and stand up for Genji, but someone had to point Hanzo his way this lovely morning, and it wouldn’t have been Athena. She still seems to view human interpersonal relationships firmly as a matter outside of her purview. McCree once saw her out an agent who'd been stringing three different lovers along in the same base because he'd tried to scold her for not reminding him of a commitment after asking her to help him keep track. The resulting chaos had taught everyone a valuable lesson: don't fuck with the patience of a benevolent but omnipresent AI.

“And you kept that awful joke of a belt buckle. I assume you have a point?”

Abruptly, the tableau they make feels comical — McCree’s often felt like the Universe was laughing at him, fate playing a cruel joke at his expense, but the expression seems especially keen at this moment. And too much to deal with even with the mildest of hangovers. Discretion being the better part of valor, he pretends not to notice how Hanzo stiffens as he edges past and over to the sink, still crowded with glassware and discarded ice molds. 

Figuring he's already in shit with Zarya, McCree grabs for her fine peppermint vodka, taking enough to hold on his tongue and swipe over his gums before sending the burn down to his rolling stomach. Half poor man's mouthwash and half hair of the dog that bit him. That done, he balls his hair up in his hand to keep it out of the way and bends to drink deep off the tap rather than dirty another glass.

He pretends not to hear the quiet, shaky exhale of breath from behind him. 

Eyes closed and mouth cold, he does a lot of pretending in those few seconds before standing up and facing facts.

The icy water goes far to cure what ails him, settling the empty, nauseous clench of his stomach and soothing the drum what pounds his ears. Hanzo’s dark eyes dig at his shoulder blades and try as he might, McCree can’t cast about for anything that feels safe to say. He opts to fill the sink, twirling the tap to hot, rather than say anything at all.

Ten years ago, Ichirō would have come up behind him, peering over his shoulder to watch with almost hostile curiosity while Jesse washed dishes by hand.

Today, Hanzo stays rooted where he is, keeping the distance between them both figurative and literal.

"Sign the forms, McCree. The sooner this farce is dealt with—” 

"Fuck you and the horse you rode in on." McCree sets the heavy-bottomed glass down hard, flicking soap suds off his hands with prejudice. Since adjusting to his prosthetic long ago, he’s been real good with not breaking shit he doesn't mean to and utterly refuses to break that streak or be goaded into a temper. 

Hanzo snarls.

Sucking in a slow, even breath through his nose, McCree counts the exhale through his mouth. In. Hold. Out. Reaches out to flick the kettle on. "It's awful rude to speak ill of the dead, honey-mine. And I'll have you know my mother was a saint."

"No saint could birth something like you."

Forcing himself to turn, McCree tries to rest against the sink in a way that looks casual and not cowardly while keeping the bartop firmly between them. Hanzo stands rooted just steps away from where McCree woke, his mask of cold superiority broken and ugly fury written across features McCree once worshipped for their sharp smiles and sweetness. "You know it don't matter none whether I choose to sign those or not."

"How so?"

"More'n one reason. The first of which being the dates specified," he pauses to throw a sharp grin at his wayward spouse, not above his own dash of bitters. "and I can’t tell you how flattered I am you kept the originals.” April of 2065, just a month before they would find Genji. If McCree’s suspicions are correct, the clan elders worked fast to exhibit as much control over Hanzo as possible once Shimada Sojiro was in the ground. Cutting away his brother and his husband, anyone who could’ve possibly supported him.

“Speak plainly."

“They passed their expiry by about nine years, hon. And suppose you find yourself a new lawyer willing to parley on behalf of men who don’t exist — it still won’t fix what’s between you and me.”

“There is nothing between us, McCree,” Hanzo spits, “that is the point. But if you want to be a pedant, you are right. Jake and Ichirō do not exist, and thus their marriage was never of any consequence.” 

“Don’t work like that, honey,” McCree says, a touch louder and more insistent over the rumble of boiling water.

“By your own logic -” 

“You’re just not gettin’ it, are you? Can’t see the forest for the trees.”

“Please, enlighten me.”

“That paper, with those names, that ain’t a marriage.” McCree licks his lips, dragging his eyes up from the old, cracked wood, stained with years of use. This is too important for loose lips and a tricky tongue. “You made a vow, in front of God and me and whatever else was listenin’ that day.”

Hanzo stiffens with affront, shifting his shoulders just a bit, tucking the left one with its swirling dragons slightly behind him.

Oh, _well_ then. McCree reins in his reaction, locking the frame that wants to lean in, like a predator on the hunt. So something else _was_ listening that day. 

He’s more than passingly familiar with Genji’s beast, a great, green serpentine thing that coils around him while he meditates. He refers to her often, noting her impressions of the world around them and using her as an extra set of eyes on missions. She’s saved McCree’s own bacon more than once. And Hanzo apparently has two of the glowing beasties lurking under his skin. If they speak to Hanzo the way Yoshi speaks to Genji, he has to wonder about their opinions on this unfolding drama.

The kettle starts to scream.

"Do you still love me?" The question escapes him before he can think better of it and he immediately wants to curse. Feels himself falter, flinching away from the pleading, pining words too honest by far.

"Do not ask stupid questions." Hanzo snaps.

That is not a no. It's not even a decent deflection. It's so obviously not a no McCree is frozen for a second, heartbeat thundering in his ears.

"You still love me, honey?" He asks again through numb lips, taking a step forward to brace his hands on the bar.

"Do not mock me!" Hanzo spits, stepping back to keep the same stretched distance between them. McCree feels it like a fishhook lodged in his chest, digging in, and pulling. "You wish to be angry with me? Fine, but you of all people do not get to mock me, hypocrite."

McCree sucks a desperate breath in through his teeth. There is so much wrong with that declaration he doesn't know where to start but he is not giving up the ground he just gained. "And just how do you figure I'm angry?"

Hanzo scoffs quietly, "You only ever call me 'honey' when you are upset with me."

Full boil achieved, the kettle clicks itself off and the sharp whistling scream fades, the water settling. Setting aside the use of present over past tense, McCree’s gotta take a good hard look in the mirror on that one. McCree turns, busying himself with mugs and strainers and the tea that Fareeha keeps in every room that’s capable of boiling the water for it, body on auto-pilot as his mind goes over and over their conversation. The Turkish blend she prefers perfumes the air in familiar comfort and behind him there’s a whisper of fabric as Hanzo’s curiosity and terrible fondness for the drink gets the better of him, luring him closer to the strong black brew. 

He hasn't called Hanzo anything but 'honey' since he woke up.

"You're trying to divorce me." McCree grits, biting back the edged endearment that wants to come out even as he knows better. At home, and however stupid it might be, McCree still thinks of that Taiwanese condo as _home_, they'd spoken a hodgepodge of languages. Ichirō — Hanzo, was homesick for Japan, convinced he could fix the thick English accent Jesse faked in his Mandarin, and likely, he faked needing to practice his own English. Through all of that, Jesse'd worked hard to find endearments he could use no matter the language they were speaking. And knew he got one right when Hanzo would try and hide his smile, trying and failing to seem stern and forbidding. 

Jesse hadn’t thought, hadn’t noticed, hadn’t even suspected the possibility that they might be tells and it was galling to be laid bare like that. He’d meant ‘I like you, I appreciate you, I love you’; Hanzo heard something Jesse never intended to convey — but can’t, in all fairness, deny. "Reckon I've got half a right to be angry."

"Please," his lips pull back in contempt and McCree steels his spine, stops himself from softening at the sight of Hanzo’s snaggled teeth still crowding his upper jaw, pushing his eye-teeth forward like fangs. "Stop pretending you did not get exactly what you wanted out of this farce."

And just like that McCree's mind snaps forward from the lovely imperfections that remain and back to the stab of hurt Hanzo is trying to push him away with. "You wanna run that by me again?"

“What exactly did Blackwatch get out of our marriage, McCree? It is not as if you kept me out of the way just to court Genji.” He says, using words like knives to lash out at the apparent threat McCree makes.

Threat of what, he ain’t sure. But Hanzo fights like Ichirō did, setting the scene for maximum effectiveness, presenting his arguments like a case that could be won. Like it was a battle instead of a disagreement, like Ichirō had to prove that Jesse was wrong using facts and evidence of wrongdoing and lashing out when he felt backed into a corner.

“Is that what you think happened?”

“Do you honestly expect me to believe otherwise?”

McCree works his jaw, consciously releasing the tension built up in himself bit by bit. “What happened is I fell in love with a beautiful, cocksure son of a gun who honored dumb bets but grudgingly.” McCree hesitates for a bare second, tongue caught by nervousness. “Shimada-san,” he settles on, unwilling to use an endearment he may not have a right to or claim a name that hasn’t been offered. “I swear, I had no idea who you were.”

Hanzo’s dark eyes bore into his, "You had no idea."

"None," McCree says, like a fervent vow.

"You left me—"

"I almost didn’t,” McCree says, almost desperate now for the whole story to come tumbling out. “I had my walkin’ papers drawn up—"

"Shut up,” Hanzo cuts him off ruthlessly. “You left. You were always going to leave.” McCree scowls but doesn’t contradict him. He can’t. “How much was real, McCree?”

It’s been a long, long while since he was ever in danger of saying too little. From the second he took his first lookout gig with Deadlock, McCree’s known the value of silence. Two things Gabe never had to teach him: how to hold his tongue and that information was always worth more than money. Being Jake McQueen was freeing in that way. In many ways. He could trust he would wake up, safe and loved. Never had to think about how much he was revealing, never worried that a preference for a specific food or drink would lead to poisoning in his future, or that a routine would kill him.

Sucking his teeth, he says, “Most of it. More than it should’ve been.” Soft and sincere, like a confession is supposed to be.

Hanzo tilts his head consideringly. “You needed to stay in Taiwan and I gave you a reason.”

“That’s why I asked you on a date, sure. But that ain’t why I married you.” McCree takes a second to draw on his courage and, reminding himself that if he hadn’t taken a mile for every inch on offer he’d of never married this man in the first place, reaches for the hand that was once second nature to grab onto and twine fingers with. Skin to glorious skin. “I married you for the same reason I want to stay married to you. Don’t ask me to sign those papers again. Because I will. If you want me to, if you mean it — I will.”

Not a line changes on Hanzo’s face; he could be carved out of stone, but McCree’s close enough he can hear the way those proud, even breaths shudder and hitch.

"Why shouldn't I?" He says, but McCree hears the true meaning clear as a bell: _Convince me_. Because beneath the grey hairs and age lines, putting aside the shared history and with a new name, he is still to his very core then man Jesse fell in love with. Still stubborn and cautious on the outside with a grinning mischief in his soul that Jesse could always talk into coming out to play. 

"Because you don't want to any more than I do." Pushing his luck for all he’s worth, McCree raises their joined hands and lays a kiss on the rough, scarred skin of Hanzo’s knuckles. The motions stutter awkwardly, but he has faith that given a chance and time they’ll regain the familiarity they once had. "Forgive me, darlin'," he says and doesn't mind that it comes out more like a demand than a plea when Hanzo licks his lips, fingers twitching against McCree's own before tightening with surprising strength.

_Oh, there you are_, his heart sings, _I’ve been looking for you forever._

"And what if I do not want to forgive you."

"Forgive me anyway," He winks, heart leaping when Hanzo snorts and breaking when he falters.

"And what if I do not deserve you?"

"Ain't about deserving, darlin', and it never has been." 

“What…” Hanzo trails off and joins McCree in a quiet huff of surprised laughter. There are enough words still left unsaid between them to fill an ocean. Even with Hanzo’s hand in his and separated only by a bare foot of worn wood, McCree feels every letter of that distance keenly. Hanzo holds onto him just as tight, fingers spasming every time he opens his mouth only to hold back the words. Like he’s worried McCree will reconsider if given enough time.

He doesn’t have to worry. McCree will tell him that, as soon as his tongue unsticks itself from the roof of his mouth and his jaw can relax. 

Hanzo’s fingers slip against his, the nervous sweat of their hands betraying them both.

“What should I call you?”

_Your husband_, leaps to the tip of his tongue and he swallows it back hard. “You’ll find most people here just call me McCree, but...there’s always Jesse, if you want.”

He doesn’t know why it feels like offering his heart on a platter to suggest his own god damned name but there it is. 

“Jesse, then,” Hanzo nods and raises up on the tips of his prosthetics to reach past Jesse to the faded ceramic mugs that hold their steeping tea. He looks ridiculous wrangling the strainers with only one hand and Jesse has trouble not melting into a besotted puddle at the sight.

“You could help.” Hanzo taps the counter-top, two quick strikes and Jesse finds himself reaching for the cream and sugar before he realizes he’s moving. Like one of the early model robots, mindlessly performing their function when given power after years of disuse.

“Fuckin’ leave it, it’s ruined anyhow.”

“Then why did you brew it?”

Jesse huffs, scratching at his unkempt beard in a weak attempt to hide the way his cheeks start to burn. “Same reason I made a bet at a carnival. I had to do something to keep you talkin’ to me.”

The Bar has no coasters. Between the humid sea air and the years of abuse, Athena seems to have given up on keeping it pristine. But even with the ringed and stained wood showing its wear, Hanzo still looks for somewhere to set his mug and his lips pinch slightly in the absence.

With much deliberation, he places his cup on the only other thing there is: the very papers he served, while sending a look daring Jesse to make something of it. Jesse sets his own mug down but roughly, purposely sloshing the bitter tea over the edges and staining those hated documents.

“You are so dramatic.”

“Me?” He cannot have heard that right. “I’m dramatic?”

“Yes. Genji told me you set them on fire and I did not believe him at first.”

“You served me divorce papers in front of everyone I know,” Jesse says and Hanzo has the grace to look slightly abashed.

“I wanted —” He starts, dropping his eyes to where his thumb is drawing slow circles around Jesse’s thumbnail. “I wanted you to feel as hurt as I was.”

And Jesse can’t help the smitten smile that steals over his face. “Petty,” he says, giddily. Hopelessly. He has never been anything but fond of Hanzo’s many negative traits. His type-A, anal-retentive, over-anxious, over-cautious, buttoned-down personality quirks that made him so damn fun to mess with. He remembers laying side by side in their bed, in their home, laughing as Hanzo, mostly jokingly, berated him.

“I cannot believe I let you talk me into that!”

Remembers the way Hanzo was smiling as he said it, rolling so his face wasn’t pressed into the pillows. The way he reached out to grab Jesse’s hand, kissed his knuckles. “You know, I count on you to talk me into things. Thank you.”

“Why'd you marry me, anyhow?"

With his other hand, Hanzo plays with the charred edges of the papers, still the gauntlet between them. “I liked how you spoke to me.” He says eventually, hushed like he’s revealing a secret. “No one had ever spoken to me the way you did.”

“How?” McCree’s voice creaks and he swallows hard. “How did I speak to you?”

He watches Hanzo hesitate, weighing the words against the feather on the scale. “Like you honestly cared what I had to say.”

Dull heat creeps into his cheeks and for a second McCree is dizzy with the feeling of being under a spotlight, being so visible to the man across from him. “I did. I do,” he says and means the words now just as much as he did ten years ago. Honesty hangs heavy, like a chain around his neck.

He’d probably miss the hitched breath if he hadn’t been watching so damn close. “You realize we are going to have to repeat every conversation we’ve ever had.” 

“Hand me my hat.”

Hanzo blinks, finally pulling his gaze away from the bar and up to Jesse’s. “Why?”

“Just do it,” Jesse rolls his eyes and is promptly faced with the decision of reaching his goal quickly but letting go of Hanzo’s hand, or continuing to be clingy and making a damn fool of himself. Well, never let it be said he lets his pride get in the way of the important things. Mercifully, Hanzo bites back his laughter and holds the damn hat steady so he can make short work of the band and the ‘decorative bullets’ that line it. Mostly, he maintains the ruse that he keeps his hat for sentimental reasons or aesthetic ones. Whichever story he tells of its history depends on who’s doing the asking and how they ask. Assumptions are gonna be made, and Jesse usually rolls with it. Uses it. Hides in plain sight. 

In actuality, they are things too precious to be kept on any server, Athena or not. The third bullet to the right of the center insignia holds a drive that keeps what few mementos he was able to salvage from his marriage. A picture he saved from Jake’s phone before the ID card was destroyed, blurry and out of focus, a digital copy of their marriage certificate, and…!

“Your favourite mathematician — sorry, _living_ mathematician,” he corrects himself before Hanzo can do more than part his lips, “is Dr. Agatha Freeman. About four years ago, I was lucky enough to attend one of her lectures in person and these,” he holds up the drive with a flourish, “are the notes I took, the questions I asked and a recording of the whole lecture.” 

Hanzo’s mouth falls open soundlessly. He sputters for more than a few seconds, the picture of shock and Jesse soaks in the memory of this moment. Compares it to the various dreams and fantasies he’s had about it and finds it’s so much better than anything he could have thought of. He couldn’t remember the strength in Hanzo’s hands, the calluses which scrape against his own rough and dry skin. 

“We don’t have to jump right back into it. We can take it as slow as you want. If you say we need to reacquaint, we’ll do that,” Jesse says, his smile still tugging at his words and working to mess up the one his nervous tongue doesn’t. “All I want to know is: will you give me the chance to love you again? I swear, this time I’ll do it right.”

Instead of grabbing the drive, or anything else Jesse might have expected him to do, Hanzo pins him with those dark eyes, something fierce and stubborn and brave all at once lightning across his face. “If you ever hurt me like that again, I will kill you.”

Throat dry, Jesse nods. 

Hanzo nods in return and, like the clouds parting for the sun after a storm, smiles. Warming Jesse all the way through. “Then yes. I would like that.”

“Good. That’s...good,” relief and wonder and a stupid amount of joy all twist up together in Jesse’s stomach, easing the last of his ever-present nausea and causing hastily blinked away tears to spring to his eyes. He leans heavy into the hand that cups his cheek, breathing through the onslaught of emotions.

“What,” Hanzo, his Hanzo, hesitates. “should we do now?”

“Can I make you breakfast,” Jesse kisses Hanzo’s palm, because he can, and pushes his luck because he can’t do otherwise, “my darlin’?”

“That depends.”

“Hm?”

“Are you any better at poaching eggs?”

Snorting with helpless laughter, Jesse lays another bigger, wetter kiss in Hanzo’s palm, just stopping himself from blowing a raspberry. “I will have you know I have improved much since our first breakfast, thank you.”

They still have oceans and deserts worth of things to talk about. Will eventually have to leave The Bar and figure out how this new version of their relationship will work, where it is fragile now and where it has been tempered. 

“Hn, I will believe that when I see it,” Hanzo smirks, not with quite his usual bite, but Jesse has faith they’ll find old patterns or create new ones.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, feel free to come hang out with me on tumblr or twitter both @nothisnotup ;D


End file.
